


A Crime of Passion and Convenience

by fanflock



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, First Meetings, M/M, Meet-Cute, Theft, bad charisma rolls
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-03
Updated: 2017-01-03
Packaged: 2018-09-14 10:44:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,626
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9178213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fanflock/pseuds/fanflock
Summary: Kravitz and Taako meet for the first time in an inn. Their charisma rolls are awful, and their stealth isn't much better.





	

“So, what’s a place like you doing in a guy like this?” A beat. “Wait. Fuck.” That was a 3, at best, and that’s with the +1 charisma modifier.

“Bit of a fantasy Freudian slip there, ey guv.” A 4, but the -2 charisma brought out his bad work accent. Shit. The elf laughed at him, though not cruelly, thank the gods. He cleared his throat, very pointedly putting his regular voice back on before asking “how about I buy you a drink and we can both try that again?” The elf relaxed against the bar.

“Please do, jeepers creepers.”

Kravitz hadn’t come to this inn with the intent of… anything, really. Getting a drink, perhaps people watching. He’d sort of lost the art of ‘going out’ in all his time on the astral plane. The elf that had approached him, Taako, was incredibly good looking and the reaper was _very_ into where this was going, but still he knew he never would have thought to approach first. Too awkward, too anxious, too low on charisma. Thankfully, Taako had taken the initiative and gotten them stumbling through awkward flirting and bad one liners into a hastily booked room upstairs.

Taako reminded him with every shuddered breath how nice the warmth of another person was. It was something he hadn’t indulged in for far too long, but where Kravitz’s mind stuttered, his hands remembered. (And if Taako noticed the hands running down his back flickered into bare bones every now and again he certainly didn’t comment on it.) He relished the feeling of holding him, letting himself indulge in the silly romantic fantasies that came with it.

Sleep was also a rare luxury to Kravitz. One he enjoyed immensely, but still not something that came naturally to him, so it was both disappointing and unsurprising when he was tugged awake again by a shift in the mattress and a warmth leaving his side.

The room was dark, not that that meant much to anyone with night vision. The soft sounds of movement from across the room were enough to make him curious, and he cracked open an eye just enough to see Taako pulling on his shirt before looking around for the rest of his outfit. It was silly how his heart dropped at the sight; he’d known they were a one night thing, but he’d sort of been hoping to at least spend the _whole_ night together. The bed felt much bigger without him in it.

He closed his eyes again; Taako had no obligation to stay, and at least he could still enjoy a night of rest he’d already paid for. There was more shuffling, then a pause, then a decidedly quieter shift, rustling… jingling? He opened his eyes again.

Taako was holding his pants, his own skirt cast aside, and was quickly emptying the pockets. Kravitz recognized his coin purse hung around the elf’s wrist.

Gods fucking damn it.

Before Taako even noticed he was awake, he rose up to his full height, skin melting off bones leaving a fiery skeleton in it’s wake. Smoke billowed around him, folding into tattered robes that draped over his form and filled the room in darkness. Taako whipped around as the fabric flickered into the corners of his vision, coins scattering beside him. He didn’t scream, to his credit, but the squeakily muttered “Jiminy fucking Christmas” did give Kravitz a small bit of satisfaction.

He didn’t try to attack, but he didn’t run either. He just sat there in, illuminated by the red fire flickering around Kravitz’s skull, looking maybe just under the appropriate level of scared and confused for this situation. Kravitz stared him down with dead eyes, and in the still silence between them, slowly, he came to realize that he… didn’t actually know what to do from here.

He had been kind of betting on a better reaction, he supposed. Like, he’d taken his turn and now it was Taako’s, but he’s not actually doing anything. Maybe the fire was a bit much. His initial annoyance had sort of buggered off and now he was left with the reality that was he wasn’t actually going to kill someone over petty theft of what was essentially god given pocket money. He didn’t even want to hurt him at all.

With a sigh, he pulled it in a bit, cutting out the fire and sitting back down on the bed. Taako’s ears perked up a bit, still staring cautiously up from the floor. Another turn passed, then a tentative chuckle.

“Neat trick, and here I was thinking you were vanilla,” Taako commented with a little smile. Kravitz wished he had an eyebrow to raise.

“What are you doing?” he asked flatly, and honestly, because what was even going on now.

“Oh! I mean, kinda thought you’d figured that out, what with the scary face, but uh, I’m juuuust…”

“Okay, no, save it, I know you’re robbing me.”

“Well. Yeah.” Taako gave him a sheepish shrug, and settled down cross legged. He looked leagues calmer now, like a child being scolded, despite Kravitz’s face still being gaunt and skinless. He still hadn’t dropped the coin purse.

“So was the sex just an extravagant prelude to stealing my lunch money then? Is this a thing you do?” That would be just Kravitz’s luck. Or his lack of awareness, more likely. Centuries of following directions and clearly identified targets had somewhat whittled away at his already meager people reading skills. He tried to think if there were any tells he should have noticed the night before, but nothing came to mind. They’d had a lovely evening as far as he could remember. Mutually awkward conversation; designed to lower his guard, maybe? But no, it had felt genuine. Were the shy glances attraction, or just him projecting? He honestly didn’t know.

“Nah,” Taako responded easily, interrupting his thoughts. “The sleeping with you was cause you’re hot. You were hot?” Taako gave his skeleton bod a quick once over. “Are hot? Anyway,” he waved that thought away with his hand, “this is a theft of convenience. Don’t take it too personally, darling. A dude’s gotta eat and all that.”

Kravitz… didn’t know what to say to that, a sensation that was becoming increasingly common around Taako. He probably should have just let him steal it and pretended not to notice. He thought about just giving him the money out of pity, but that would probably just agitate the elf’s pride. Also, he looked notably less like a starving vagrant and more like a cocky middle-classer who wanted some new earrings. So there wasn’t that much pity to be felt.

Instead, out of all those threads and thoughts, he replied with a lukewarm, “I would have bought you breakfast.”

“Oh.” Taako’s ears flickered slightly as he mulled over that statement. “…is that offer still open?”

Kravitz stared. “You… you’re in the middle of stealing from me?”

“Yeah but I can stop.” He dropped Kravitz’s coin purse back onto his pile of discarded clothes. “See, no harm done. Who’s getting robbed? Certainly not you, my man.” Kravitz stared at him. He stared, then took a moment longer to just comprehend what was happening, how one elf could be so damn sure of himself that he could stare Death in the face and just frankly not give a shit. He tried to understand what sort of life he was living where getting caught mid-crime by a skeletal monster was just a minor inconvenience on the path to a free meal.

But then, some small amount of relief washed over him as he realized no, he hadn’t been projecting in their earlier interactions. This was exactly the elf who had used the “is that a wand in your pocket” line on him in complete sincerity earlier that night and expected it to work (it did.) This was the elf he now really wanted to figure out. Over coffee preferably. Taako smiled at him hopefully.

“You know what, sure,” he conceded, pulling flesh over bone and sheets over flesh. “I was looking forward to sleeping in. Let me do that and I’ll buy breakfast.”

“Sweet, deal.” Taako took off his shirt again and clambered back into the bed, making himself very comfortable amongst the pillows. The fear from before had all but melted off his shoulders somehow, and he looked nearly as relaxed as he had when they’d fell on back on the mattress earlier than evening, when he’d looked at Kravitz with some sort of breathless reverence. Tentatively, selfishly, Kravitz moved his arm around the elf’s soft waist, pulling him closer.

“Oof, not letting me get away this time huh?” Kravitz flinched, belatedly realizing that was probably how that looked. He pulled his arm back, just slightly.

“Sorry, is this… alright?” Taako was quiet for a moment, and it’s just when Kravitz was about to pull away completely that he pushed back against him, warm back flush against his cool chest.

“Yeah, that’s pretty good actually. It’s too damn hot in this room.” He curled his small hands around Kravitz’s own, pulling them to his chest. He rubbed his fingers across the knuckles, a small, distracted action, reminiscent of some kind of fondness Kravitz hadn’t been on the receiving end of in a long while. He melted into it, eyes fluttering shut as the cold in his hands thawed slowly from the elf’s warmth.

“So, is this cold skin thing related to the skeleton thing? Cause that made sense when I first thought of it, but now I’m remembering the skeleton was also on fire, so maybe—“

“Taako, remember what I said about sleeping in?”

“Right. Bother you at breakfast then.”

“Bother me at breakfast.”

**Author's Note:**

> does this count as a meet cute. I'm saying it does. TAZ twitter @pocketspa


End file.
